CAIRO – 3 November 2018: President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi officially launched the second edition of the World Youth Forum (WYF) on Saturday at the end of the opening session.
The opening session was attended by hundreds of participants, as well as keynote speakers, top officials and prominent individuals from all over the world.
The evening started off with participants and delegates arriving to the venue at 5 p.m., where they took their seats.
While some participants had brought flags along to show-off their country, others enjoyed talking to their fellows or chatting via the World Youth Forum mobile application.
Shortly afterwards, President Sisi arrived at the venue where he started to receive high profile attendees, like Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
The event started with Hany Milad Hanna, the son of the famous Egyptian intellect Milad Hanna, who wrote the infamous book “The Seven Pillars of Egyptian identity”. The idea that Egyptians have seven key characteristics is the key theme of the second edition of the forum.
The seven pillars are:
1- We are descents of the Pharaohs.
2- Our Pharaonic civilization is merged with the Greek and Roman philosophy.
3- The Coptic culture has enriched us.
4- Islamic rituals have strengthened us.
5- The spread of the Arabic language improved our literature.
6- We adopted Mediterranean customs.
7- We are a part of the African Continent and we belong to the Nile basin countries.
Hanna spoke of the great influence that the 1919 Revolution had on his father; to Milad Hanna, the concept of national unity between Muslims and Christians was key and was born out of this revolution.
Milad Senior was an open man, who loved to travel and see new people. He believed that people are good and that they can work together.
From his travels, he started to evolve more and more. His travel and studies abroad taught him to never underestimate one or hold prejudice against anyone who is different, a lesson that he learnt after an incident with a Chinese individual whom he had previously underestimated.
He continued to evolve after coming back to Egypt, Hanna Junior explains, and was eager and adamant on reaching African integration.
“My father was eager to achieve economic African integration through trade and a railway network.”
After his moving speech, a speech that showed us why this book was chosen to be the main theme, for Milad Hanna depicts Egyptians more than well in the book, and is also a stellar example of a great Egyptian himself.
Following this, a documentary showcasing Egypt’s best touristic and most magical places was played. It started off with Reem Moustafa at Mount Sinai where Moses talked to God. Throughout the documentary Moustafa explores beautiful sites and talks to different people, including Egyptian Bedouins and Nubians.
Talking to one Nubian man, Moustafa learns, and so do viewers, that Nubians use music to express themselves and tell their stories and history. We also learn that after the spread of Islam in North Africa, Muslims used to pass through Siwa oasis on their way to pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia’s Mecca.
Following the video, United Nations Youth Envoy, Jayathma Wickramanayake, made her speech. Talking about the importance of working to achieve sustainable development and peace through empowering the youth and making sure their voices are heard, the Sri Lankan explains that putting an end to poverty and hunger are can be achieved in one generation only if the youths are to be heard.
“The opportunity is now and it will not last long.”
“The reality is that young people are often denied a seat at the decision-making table,” she said, “To achieve sustainable development and peace it is crucial to change the narrative and recognise the youth as innovators, not problems makers, as leaders of today, not of tomorrow.”
The UN Youth envoy explains that it is important for the youths to be given a change to fix developmental problems; without them, change and sustainability are but a dream.
In the spirit of achieving sustainable development, the United Nations Security-General launched the UN Youth Strategy and invited Member States to follow this, she explained.
Young women do not enjoy rights similar to their male peers due to: FGM, child marriage and at least 130 million girls are out of school, the UN Youth Envoy pointed out.
We stand with implementation of Egypt’s program to empower young women as part of the sustainable development goals, Wickramanayake said ending her speech on a strong note.
Then, Egyptian Streets founder Mohamed Khairat took to the stage to speak of the importance of being responsible on social media, a topic that has come to the forefront of the nation’s attention recently.
Khairat spoke shortly of his success story, encouraging the youth to use social media to spread real information, warning of the dangers of fake news.
Taking the stage after him, Nobel Peace Prize Winner Nadia Murad spoke of the pains that Yazidis have seen, citing the forced displacement of one million Yazidis.
“The Islamic state forced half million Yazidis to flee their homes in Iraq.”
Without implanting the culture of tolerance and punishing those who commit heinous attacks, we cannot achieve peace, Murad explained.
“We cannot reach comprehensive peace without acknowledging each other as different people, with different customs and religions.”
Commending the Egyptian troops for their efforts in the fight against terrorism, the Nobel Peace Prize Winner said, “We know the effort done by Egyptian troops to fight terrorism. We, the youth, should work together to come closer to young people to save them from extremism, and enforce positive thinking.”
Speaking after Murad, the grandson of Nelson Mandela, Zondwa Mandela, spoke highly of the World Youth Forum and in its role in enabling the youths to take on international issues.
“After exiting prison, my grandfather kept negotiating with South African President (at that time) to eliminate apartheid,” started saying before he moved on to the importance of the youths in today’s world.
“I am here to encourage you not to limit the scope or scale of your dreams.”
“This is the place and the time for your life to make a difference. The energy represented by the youth is a power that no one can question. Because you have the desire to question, the desire to argue, and the desire to change.”
Finally, the moment all participants had been waiting for: President Sisi took to the stage to officially announce the start of the second edition of the World Youth Forum.
“Let me start by welcoming all of you in Egypt and by saying I love you all,” Sisi said at the beginning of his speech.
Addressing Murad, who had made a truly moving speech, Sisi said, “Nadia, we will demand the entire the world to admit the crimes committed by the Islamic state. We in Egypt rejected extremism. Thirty million protested to reject discrimination and fascism.”
“Say no to discrimination... no to religious extremism.”
Officially, the second edition of the World Youth Forum was launched.
Shortly following the opening session, President Sisi inaugurated the Reviving Humanity Memorial.
The second annual edition of the WYF will tackle two main axes: peace and development. The forum will bring together 5,000 youths represented by 60 delegations from across the world to explore key issues facing their generation, and determine their role in implementing the global development goals and in facing terrorism.
The first axis will discuss reconstructing post-conflict countries and societies, the role of world leaders in achieving peace, the duty of the international community to provide humanitarian assistance and counter-terrorism, and the Euro-Mediterranean partnership.
The axis of development will include topics related to energy and water security, empowerment of people with disabilities, the role of voluntary work in building societies, the agenda of 2063 African Sustainable Development, digital citizenship, the role of art and cinema in shaping communities, ways to build future leaders, and means of shrinking the gender gap in the work force.
The WYF 2018 agenda
According to the agenda of the World Youth Forum, on Nov. 1 and 2, the forum witnessed pre-workshops related to the "agenda 2063: The Africa We Want" and "Empowering Persons with Disabilities: Towards a More Integrated World."
The opening of the World Youth Theater took place on Friday, November 2. The actual discussion sessions are planned to start on November 4, where participants will discuss a number of issues, including differences among cultures and civilizations, the role of world leaders in building and sustaining peace, the role of soft power in countering ideological extremism and terrorism, and Day Zero: Water security in the wake of climate change.
On November 5, the sessions will tackle the role of entrepreneurs and start-ups in global economic growth, rebuilding societies and states after conflicts, narrowing the gender gap in the labor market and humanitarian assistance: A global responsibility in the face of challenges.
The forum's closing session and the announcement of the World Youth Forum 2018's recommendations will take place on Nov. 6.
Noha El- Tawil contributed to this report via live reporting
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